LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXII, Issue 90, 15 April 1912, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The monthly meeting of the Bor ugh Council will be held tins evening

Mr. W. Brooking this morning received the sad intelligence from his laugher, Mrs. A. Palmer, that her

son Jack (Mr. Brooking’s fourth grandson) was accidentally shot at Manurowa yesterday.

Some good catches oi trout were made in the upper readies of the Ashburton River during the Raster holidays. One angler landed sixty-eight average-sized fish, and another forty, while a number of other nice baskets were obtained. The fishing season will close at the end of this month. “There must ho something very comfortable about that Mayoral chair, judging by the keeness of the contest for it.” Yes, the remark was made in Stratford, but it was made many years ago, in fact, it was a remark by Mr. Mo'r at a banquet in 1903. The chair' probably needs upholstering anew.

Some sixty or seventy farmers left by the mail train this morning on a visit to the Moumahaki State Farm. The trip should be of considerable benefit to the fanning community generally, and the Stratford A. and P. Association is to be congratulated on bringing the proposed visit to a successful issue.

Mr. Thomas Webb, of Bird Road, ha's on view at Mr. Xcwton King’s Mart a very fine collection of soft turnips grown by him. The collection comprises Hurst’s Purple Top and Green Top, Yellow Aberdeen, Romney Marsh, Imperial Green Glove, White Stone, and Purple Top Mammoth turnips. i)’or showing what can he don? by careful and judicious growing, this collection is excell,,'lit, and is well worthy of inspection by all interested in turnip growing.

The Government recently purchased from Mr. E. E. Stndholmc a property at Waimate consisting of 1700 acres, which will be subdivided into small holdings of from five to thirty acres for fruitgrowing and workmen’s farms. There will be three or four pastoral sections on the hills, and the leases will have a clause protecting the remaining bush in the gullies. The people of Stratford have responded very heartily to requests foi funds in aid of the 11th Regiment’s Sports Club, £2O having been already handed over to Captain Lampen for this purpose. It is hoped the public will take full advantage of the opportunity to visit the camp of Hid, Regiment to he held at Hawera, the best days for visiting the camp being Sunday, and on Wednesday, the 24th inst., when the regimental sports wiL be held, The curious fact is.recalled that the Bank of England, which is just now appealing against its rates, has', the, right to sell beer without a license. This privilege was granted to the Bankin its Charter of Incorporation under the Great Seal, dated July 27, 1691. And so the Bank, if it liked (says a Daily Chronicle gossip), could open a public-house in T'hroadneedlc Street, or could send drays round and deliver beer ft your door. a The New Zealand Trade Commissioner : reports 1 that California butte; merchants prefer butter in Cube-shap ed boxes, as the butter in their market is put up iu pound and two-pound blocks, and their cutting machines ar'e made so as to cut up ihe pkact weight ’>ahd ‘quantity, from the cube boxes without!any waste. They have stated that the quality of the N,sw Zealand butter is so good that they can sell h in their own wrappers as the best California production. They defend their custom of selling New Zealand butter as Californian by the argument that the consumers would expect to ipurchase it if sold as New Zealand at ■cents «per pound less than their own product, because they think their own is the best in the world. A woman called' at the Fremantle “offices of the Adelaide Steamship Company the other, day, and found out for the first time that her husband was aboard the missing steamer Koombana. She admitted that she had parted from him on bad terms, but she did not know where ho had gone. On the previous Thursday night she bad a dream, in which she pictured her husband clinging to the rigging of the boat. She swam out to hi,s assistance, but being unsuccessful in her mission, swam back again. It is a peculiar coincidence that the Koombana left Port Hedland on the Wednesday, and must, according to the experiences of other craft, have met the centre of the cyclonic disturbance on the Thursday night. Mr. John McDonald, who was the first to bring in the news of the White Cliffs massacre on February 13, 1869, is at present staying at the*Terminus Hotel. Mr. McDonald’s family were settlors in the district, and Mr. John McDonald, having business at the White Cliffs, rode over there, only to find that the Rev. Mr. Whiteley, Lieutenant Gascoigne, and bis family, and Messrs. Milne and Richards, had been murdered. Mr McDonald brought the news to Waitara, and Mr. W. D. Webster brought it on to New Plymouth by steamer. Mr. McDonald followed next morning, and returned to Pukoarnhe with the volunteers and militia, to act as guide for them. The Southland Daily Times reports that a very flue specimen of the Maori axe was found on the Ringway Estate last week. It is fashioned out of. a particularly fine transparent greenstone of those parts. It is an interesting relic, inasmuch that it possibly marks the route of some conquering band of natives from some other part of the island, perhaps those who drove the remnants of the supposed lost tribe up towards Manapouri and Te An;ui. It is also interesting from a gooligists point of view as it was found on the river flat adjacent to tlio Apariiua, and on top of the ground, showing that the silting up of this land is not so recent as is generally supposed. Tim April “Windsor Magazine,” to] hand from Mr H. J. Hopkins, is an] attractively varied number, containing a complete new Dartmoor story, by I Eden Phillpotts, and short stories, ranging from grave to gay, by Fred' M. White, 31 ary Gaunt, G. B. Lancaster, M. R. Rinehart, John Barrett, and other favourite authors.' Charles G. I). Roberts contributes a new study of wild life, and an inter-'

rating article traces the evolution of the submarine boat, with a number, of illustrations, ranging from the ear Post experiments down to the latest inventions of the kind. The fine art feature consists of an article on 1 the Public Art Gallery'of Preston,! with-reproductions of fifteen pictures! by distinguished modern artists, to-; gethcr with a finely-printed coloured : plate, from Laslett Pott’s charming u'eture of “Priscilla,” the heroine of ! Longfellow’s poem, “The Courtship of .Miles Standisli.” Altogether, tin's|

:s a notable' number of good fiction nd valuable articles lavishly illustrat-